The Social Contract Theory Since The United States

It argued that King George III and his ministers had violated the contract. Thomas Jefferson also called the social contract theory “pure Locke”. The idea of the social contract had a huge impact on the Founding Fathers, especially Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. The U.S. Constitution itself starts with the three words, "We the people..." embodying this idea of popular sovereignty in the very beginning of this key document. Thus, government that is established by the free choice of its people is required to serve the people, who in the end have sovereignty, or supreme power to keep or get rid of that government

The current United States social contract is the way a majority of the people live. The majority being, the entire population outside of the rich and famous. While this can be debated person to person, as well as the idea of what the social contract is, I would describe the current United States social contract as a combination of fear and survival. These concepts often can intertwine; however, they can also be distinguished separately. The social contract will continue to evolve as the country changes, as one can see throughout the media and life in general.

proving that presidents use volunteering as ulterior motives to gain political clout. Next, I show

The sway of public perception in the negative direction can be detrimental to one’s political campaign. That’s why blasting spam mail that can alter the results of an election is something of questionable moral standards. A few pieces of information were omitted that could have helped form a more complete answer: which political party is being hurt? What is in the email? How detrimental was the content to the injured candidate? Knowing that I am politically biased, I know I would agree with the decision if I supported one candidate and it led to him or her winning; however, I will look into the issue ignoring this idea.

Critiques of social contract theories abound, even including criticisms from social contract theorists themselves, such as Jean-Jacques Rousseau. John Locke’s social contract theory remains one of the prominent theories to this day, and includes the idea that a thing owned in common can be obtained by adding one’s labor to it. Critics of social contract theories aren’t simply seeking to negate the theories of social contract theories, but in many cases are seeking to enhance them and show how they can be applied to certain principles. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel is one critic of social contract theory, who begins his work with an alternative to foundational state of nature conjectures used by social contract theorists such as

In my opinion the Social Contract Theorist that has the best theory for society today is John Locke. John Locke believed that people’s natural rights could not be taken away or given up voluntarily, and that it is the government’s job to protect the natural rights of citizens. It is important that citizens get the protection of their natural rights so they are not under the control of the government. Instead the government is protecting its citizen’s rights. Locke also believed that if a government violated natural rights the citizens had a right to revolt. People need to have control over their own life and if the government is infringing on those rights the people should be able to revolt and have a voice in changing how the government is

Social contract theory, nearly as old as philosophy itself, is the view that persons' moral and/or political obligations are dependent upon a contract or agreement among them to form the society in which they live. (Friend 2017) Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau are the best known are the best-known proponents of this enormously influential theory, which has been one of the most dominant theories within moral and political theory throughout the history of the modern West. (Friend 2017)

In the 17th and 18th centuries, during the Enlightenment, people began to query established views concerning the government, religion, economics and science. Many philosophers and historians began to develop all sorts of new theories that challenged current stances on said topics. In Europe, the moral and political aspects of their established foundation of power was challenged by the social contract theory. According to, “Social contract theory, nearly as old as philosophy itself, is the view that persons’ moral and/or political obligations are dependent upon a contract or agreement among them to form the society in which they live” (***). There are three intellectuals that are given credit for forming the social contract theory: Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. They all had the same fundamental idea but each construed it uniquely.

In the Social Contract theory, certain individual liberties must be limited to protect the broader societal interests. For example, Michigan State University is looking to ban whiteboards because they think that it will help stop students from participating in sexual slurs and racist labeling. In theory, this seems logical because clearly various people have witness hateful messages on the whiteboards of minorities as well as just hateful sayings in general. So, an easy way to eliminate people from being able to write cruel things on the whiteboards would be to take them away. However, if they take them away, who is to say students will not just write mean things on the actual door?

In a first part, discuss various social contract and human nature theories in liberal discourse, paying specific attention to the differences in principles of theory.

Suppose we gathered, just as we are, to choose the principles to govern our collective life—to write a social contract. What principles would we choose? We would probably find it difficult to agree. Different people would favor different principles, reflecting their various interests, moral and religious beliefs, and social positions. Some people are rich and some are poor; some are powerful and well connected; others, less so. Some are members of racial, ethnic, or religious minorities; others, not. We might settle on a compromise. But even the compromise would likely reflect the superior bargaining power of some over others. There is no reason to assume that a social contract arrived at in this way would be a just arrangement (Sandel, 2015).

John Locke embedded his political ideas in the form of two treatises popularly known as Two Treatises on Civil Government that he authored in 1690. In the first treatise, Locke disagrees with the political and social philosophy of Robert Filmer in his work known as Patriacha, authored in 1654. The second treatise contains Locke’s viewpoint on political philosophy where he expounds the origin, authority and the significance of a civil government. In addition, the treatise contains his view on the state of nature, the social contract, political groupings, types of government and a citizen’s right to own private property.

Firstly, in this essay, we will describe and analyze the various concepts of the evolution and emergence of the modern social contract theory thru the analysis of several of its key political thinkers. We will provide a detailed review of the concepts that have developed and that were crucial for the emergence and evolution of this theory including the questions of the origin of society and the legitimacy of the authority of the state over the individuals. We will describe the social context in which the modern social contract theory has

Social contract theory (or contractarianism) is a concept used in philosophy, political science and sociology to denote an implicit agreement within a state regarding the rights and responsibilities of the state and its citizens, or more generally a similar concord between a group and its members, or between individuals. All members within a society are assumed to agree to the terms of the social contract by their choice to stay within the society without violating the contract; such violation would signify a problematic attempt to return to the state of nature. It has been often noted, indeed, that social contract theories relied on a specific anthropological conception of man as either "good" or "evil". Thomas

The social contract and the push for individuals to enter it rely on some conception of a state of nature. Whilst the expected behaviour of persons in the state of nature differs among the social contract theorists, the classical writings all share one common feature, a “generalised potential for threat” from other persons (Dicus 2015, p. 105). However, the nature of this threat in the hypothetical state of nature is not verifiable, as is the transition to civil society. The “signing” of the social contract is also not literal, and none of the societies that the social contract theorists write from have entered into such an agreement. The most comparable circumstance to agreeing to enter into a social contract is the period of rebuilding society after revolution, but this relies on members of the society having the freedom to remain an individual or join (Gough 1957). The killing of dissenting persons also suggests that comparison is ineffective. Even so, social contract remains a popular justification of the state, albeit declining in popularity since the 17th and 18th century, despite its hypothetical nature. Rawls attempts to justify it by arguing that the demands of the hypothetical contract with equal and frees individuals are the closest theorists can come to being a voluntary scheme of obedience to the law (Simmons 1999). On the other hand, William Paley (cited in Gough 1957, p.197) argues that a non-factual contract cannot be used as a foundation for any theory and